Wisconsin Death Trip

Dir: James Marsh

1999

**

James Marsh’s 1999 docudrama is not easy viewing. It’s not a documentary in the classic sense, in that it has no narrative and no real story. Based on the 1973 book by Michael Lesy, who was inspired by the photographs of Charles Van Schaick, Wisconsin Death Trip is exactly what the title suggests. The film dramatizes Schaick’s photos while Ian Holm reads out a series of newspaper articles written during a spate of macabre incidents that took place in Black River Falls, Wisconsin in the late 19th century. It’s the sort of thing you might find as part of an art installation in an art gallery, rather than in a cinema. I like the idea on paper, it is chilling, depressing and explores the very depths of misery. My kind of film for sure. It just became incredibly uncomfortable to watch after minutes. The film’s run time is a torturous 76 minutes, and even though the imagery is striking, Ian Holms voice lovely and DJ Shadow’s music effective, it’s still a million miles away from entertaining. It is, essentially, someone reading out a list to a collection of very similar looking photographs. It is very slow, unapologetically monotonous and utterly unrelenting. You get the picture after a few minutes but Marsh is intent on drilling the message into the audience, repeating it over and over until it sticks. The problem I found was that it had the opposite effect. What I think was meant to be hypnotic, became almost invisible, like TV snow (visual white noise). Indeed, it was as if I was told to watch TV snow for hours on end with the promise that I would eventually see something. I have an open mind, Wisconsin Death Trip works best for those with a creative one, but I think even the most creative individual would struggle, especially as it is itself, fairly uncreative. I found it mind numbing if I’m going to be brutal about it but I will always congratulate a film maker on making something original. Wisconsin Death Trip is certainly a one off, there is no other film like it and that is to James Marsh’s credit, but it is probably for the best. Marsh has gone on to direct some of my favorite documentaries of recent years, good on him for trying new things - without wanting to sound condescending.